It certainly did for me.
Like many people working in theatre, I wondered what these tools would mean for creative work. Would they replace designers? Would they flatten originality? Would they encourage shortcuts instead of craft?
Those questions still matter.
But over the past year I’ve found myself interested in AI for a very different reason.
Not because it can generate images.
Because it allows people who understand problems to build solutions.
I’ve Always Been Interested in Technology
Long before ChatGPT, I was the person who enjoyed finding better workflows.
I like automation.
I like efficient systems.
I enjoy discovering software that removes repetitive work so I can spend more time designing.
That interest became more obvious while interviewing for faculty positions. Nearly every dean wanted to discuss artificial intelligence—not simply whether students should use it, but how education itself would change. Those conversations forced me to think beyond renderings and image generation.
The real shift wasn’t AI creating artwork.
It was AI lowering the barrier between having an idea and building something useful.
Graduate School and a Small Frustration
During graduate school at UC Irvine I started working with 3D printers.
Like many scenic designers, I built physical models digitally before producing them.
There was always one small annoyance.
Theatre drafting lives in architectural scales.
3D printers live in millimeters.
Every print meant stopping what I was doing, converting dimensions, checking the math, exporting files, testing, correcting, and repeating the process.
It wasn’t difficult.
It was simply repetitive.
I remember thinking more than once:
“Someone should really make an app for this.”
Then I moved on with my day because building software wasn’t something scenic designers did.
Designers Understand Problems
One thing scenic designers become very good at is recognizing friction.
We constantly notice the extra steps.
The missing tool.
The repetitive calculation.
The spreadsheet everyone has copied for ten years.
The backstage workaround everyone accepts because “that’s just how we’ve always done it.”
Theatre teaches you to solve problems.
What it usually doesn’t teach you is how to turn those solutions into software.
Until now.
AI Changed Who Gets to Build
The biggest misconception about AI is that it replaces expertise.
My experience has been almost the opposite.
AI still doesn’t know what scenic designers actually need.
It doesn’t know how Rosco paint systems work.
It doesn’t know why a production designer needs to convert scale drawings for 3D printing.
It doesn’t understand research workflows, drafting packages, production calendars, portfolio organization, or how we actually communicate with directors.
I do.
What AI has done is make it possible for me to explain those workflows to a computer that can help write the code.
Instead of learning software engineering over the next five years before building my first application, I can iterate, test ideas, refine features, and focus on the experience itself.
I’m still designing.
The medium has simply changed.
Solving Problems Instead of Learning Languages
One realization surprised me.
I don’t actually enjoy programming.
I enjoy solving problems.
Those are very different things.
Writing code is a skill.
Finding useful problems to solve is a design skill.
Artificial intelligence has allowed me to spend more time in the second category.
Rather than asking, “How do I write Swift?”
I can ask, “How should this tool work for a scenic designer?”
That’s a question I’m uniquely qualified to answer.
The First Apps
That realization led me to build tools I wished had existed years ago.
Some organize research.
Some manage production images.
Some simplify calculations I perform constantly.
None of them are trying to reinvent theatre.
They’re simply removing small points of friction that add up over the course of a career.
Ironically, these are the kinds of ideas I had long before AI.
The difference is that now I can actually build them.
Looking Forward
I still believe great scenic design begins with research, collaboration, and human judgment.
No algorithm walks into a rehearsal room.
No language model understands the personalities of a production team.
No software replaces the experience of standing onstage and realizing something needs to change before opening night.
But I also believe our profession benefits when designers build tools for other designers.
For me, AI hasn’t replaced creativity.
It has expanded where creativity can live.
Sometimes that creativity becomes a set design.
Sometimes it becomes an application that saves another designer fifteen minutes every day.
Both begin the same way.
With someone noticing a problem and deciding it could be better.